The Greek power metal gods Firewind, who house pioneering guitar extraordinaire Gus G when he’s not off with the legendary Ozzy Osbourne and playing his songs, have released a new live album to celebrate their 10th anniversary. The live album, entitled Apotheosis – Live 2012 features iconic tracks from throughout Firewind’s extensive musical career and was recorded during their Few Against Many tour at shows in Greece and other countries in Europe. Clocking in at 69 minutes and featuring anthems from throughout their career, it breathes new fire into the band and shows a different side to them than their previous live release from 2008: Live Premonition.

Apotheosis – Live 2012 also features the final performances of Firewind’s vocalist Apollo Papathanasi, who has since left the band. His replacement, Kelly Sundown Carpenter (Adagio, Beyond Twilight) will be taking to the stage as a session front man for all of the band’s upcoming 2013 shows.

Firewind have again rekindled their long standing relationship with artist Gustavo Sazes who’s art has graced releases from the likes of Arch Enemy and Dream Evil, for the cover artwork of Apotheosis – Live 2012. It incorporates live photography of the band by Hans-W. Rock and is awesome to behold.

Greece’s premier power metal act Firewind, whom are spearheaded by Ozzy Osbourne’s band member and guitar-wizard Gus G, are set to release a new live album, titled Apotheosis – Live 2012, through Century Media on 24th June in Europe and 24th July in Japan through Marquee Records. The live album celebrates the band’s 10th anniversary.

Few Against Many is the first song to be released from the album and is being streamed via Germany’s Classic Rock Magazine at this location.

Greek melo-power metallers Firewind, featuring the guitar-wizard Gus G., have recently returned from an extensive North American tour together with Turisas and Stolen Babies, on which Kelly Sundown Carpenter (Adagio, Beyond Twilight) debuted as session frontman.

Now, Firewind are happy to reveal that they will be releasing a new live album on June 24th 2013 via Century Media Records in Europe to celebrate the 10th band anniversary in style. Entitled Apotheosis – Live 2012, the album will contain 17 songs recorded at special anniversary shows in Greece as well as all over Europe during the band’s Few Against Many tour in 2012 with a playing time of 69 minutes featuring a great overview of the band’s career so far, which spans over 7 studio albums so far. This live-album also marks the final release with long term singer Apollo Papathanasio, who decided to step down from his duties as singer by the end of last year.

Firewind’s Gus G. has checked in to comment the release as follows:

Apotheosis = the glorification of a subject to a divine level.

That is the word that came to my mind, while thinking of how I could best describe the feeling & the vibe of those 4 anniversary shows we played in our homeland Greece and our last European headline tour in 2012! So that had to be our live album’s title. You can feel the energy on these recordings, you can hear the screams of the most hardcore fans & the FIREWIND chants…it’s all there.

No doubt about it, it’s the sheer love from our fans and supporters that has kept us alive and strong for 10 years and we wanted to celebrate all that with this album.

We recorded all those shows, chose the best performances and now we can’t wait to release this one! See you out there this spring & summer on European festival stages!

Firewind’s latest studio album, Few Against Many, was mixed by Jason Suecof and Eyal Levi at Audiohammer Studios (Trivium, All That Remains, Death Angel, etc.) and mastered by Alan Douches at West West Side Music (Mastodon, Hatebreed, Symphony X, etc.). The iconic album’s artwork was once again created by Firewind’s longtime partner in all design matters, Gustavo Sazes (Arch Enemy, Angra, Dream Evil, etc.). While the album’s standard version is available in the CD format as well as LP and also as Digital Download, Few Against Many is also released as limited edition Digipak CD with two bonus tracks. Few Against Many occupied the national sales charts in Greece at the # 1 top spot for several weeks!

Greek symphonic metal band Meden Agan release their debut long player, ‘Erevos Aenaon’. An independently released album featuring 9 tracks (plus three ‘extended versions’ to make 12 tracks total,) of keyboard led, operatic metal. Meden Agan have shared the billing with bands such as ‘Lacuna Coil’, ‘Epica’, ‘Xandria’ and ‘Delain’ amongst others and as such should grant you a pretty good idea of what to expect from this release.

Since Nightwish blew the doors open for female fronted, bombastic metal with an operatic flavour back in 2004 (‘Once‘), many bands have aspired to their success. Festivals have even been created especially to cater to fans wanting to see all female-fronted metal. There are fans of all ages drawn to the accessibility of symphonic/power metal, but in the same breath others are repelled by the very same aspects of the genre. Meden Agan know the staples that make good operatic metal, they incorporate the riffs and keyboard flourishes you’d expect of the genre, and they have two very strong talents in singer Iliana Tsakiraki and keyboardist Tolis Mikroulis. The only issue is that Meden Agan are just…good.

There are fans who will soak this album in like a sponge and love every grandiose sing along chorus; but for the fair weather listener, it’s the self-same chugging riffs, keyboard introductions and grandiose chorus’ heard on albums by any of the bands listed above. The songs are well written with an ear for harmony and note perfect melodies by soprano Iliana Tsakiraki, ‘Dissolve Into Grey’ displays the excellent musicianship of both guitars and keyboards, and album highlight ‘Tribute To Life’ shows what potential there is for true greatness if the band were to take a few more risks.

‘Erevos Aenaon‘ is a strong starting point for a band in their ascendency. With a little more originality and a little less adherence to the genre’s clichés, Meden Agan should be appearing at metal festivals all around Europe in the future.

Emerald Sun have been a part of the Greek power metal for thirteen years now, with a surprisingly small discography. “Regeneration” is the newest addition to said discography.

The album begins with the track “We Won’t Fall”, which begins with a rhythmic drum intro which is soon accompanied by a rock sounding riff. The guitar goes slightly more metal when the synths make themselves heard. The vocals have a very Judas Priest-meets-Iced Earth sound to them. The synth riff gets irritatingly repetitive throughout the track. There is a technical use of guitar work which improves the track a fair bit. However, the highlight of the track is the guitar solo. “Theater of Pain” follows after. It begins with the sound of clapping followed by a drum intro. The guitar riff that follows has a slight Dragonforce sound to it. There is a great use of double bass pedal throughout the track and the synth riffs work well with the guitars. The guitar solo sounds choppy to begin with but soon improves. There is a line of narration towards the end of the track, which gives the track a little bit of a Gothic novella sound.

Next is “Where Angels Fly” which begins with a heavier riff than the past two tracks. The vocals sound a tad lower as well and the synths work extremely well with the guitars. The drums on the other hand do sound quiet compared to the synths, guitars, bass and vocals. Some of the guitar sections on this track aren’t exactly impressive, as they lack technicality and musicianship. The solo, however, is good. The title track “Regeneration” comes after, being composed entirely of eerie and epic sounding synths. “Starchild” comes blasting in next with a fierce combination of guitars, drums and keyboards. The vocals, again, sound slightly lower. The keyboard riffs are more impressive on this track than they have been on the previous ones.

“Speak of the Devil” is next, beginning with a synth-and-drums intro. The guitars soon make themselves heard. The vocals sound like a harsher version of those found on a Manowar album to begin with and go back to sounding like a Judas Priest-Iced Earth combination. The synth sections sound great, especially when combined with the vocals and drums. Next is “Planet Metal” which begins with a heavy intro which is soon accompanied by synths and vocals. There is a slight use of squeaky vocals as well which kind of ruins the song. Aside from that, it is an okay track.

“Chasing The Wind” is next, which begins with a mixture of guitar, drums and synth. It isn’t exactly a heavy track, as it sounds more like a hard rock track rather than a metal track. The guitar solo, however, does add an element of metal to the track. Next is “Fantasmagoria” which begins with a slow synth intro, which is soon accompanied by a slow guitar riff and female vocals. The male vocals come in when the track turns heavier. There is also a use of harsher vocals, which sound eerily familiar to that of Marco from Nightwish. The guitar solo is similar to that of something that Megadeth would perform. After the guitar solo, there is another vocal section in which a new set of vocals come in, which sound a tad bit like those of the late, great Dio. The only problem with this album is that it’s far too long.

The last track of the album is the bonus track, which is a cover of Bonnie Tyler’s “Holding Out For A Hero”. It begins with a few chords played on the keyboard and a few quick blast-beats. After that the main keyboard riff begins. The guitars soon come in, bringing the metal element to the track. The vocals soon follow, sounding very much like Bonnie Tyler, almost to the point where the the vocals sound like female vocals. The guitar solo, however, is absolutely immense. If anything, this cover is probably more of a comical cover than a serious tribute to Bonnie Tyler.

Most bands normally get their sound perfect by their third album. Emerald Sun however have failed to do so. “Regeneration” is a great album but it sounds as if it is lacking in parts. Hopefully, Emerald Sun will have their sound perfected by the next album release.